Knowledge of Iranian general practitioners for acetaminophen dosing in children.

OBJECTIVE

This study aims to explore the knowledge of a randomly selected cohort of Iranian general practitioners (GPs) on the topic of acetaminophen dosing for fever in children.

METHODS

In this cross-sectional study, which was conducted in March 2011 in Isfahan (Iran) 515 GPs who were practicing general family medicine were sent a self-administered 10-item questionnaire about the usage of acetaminophen for fever in pediatric patients. Questions were designed to evaluate the knowledge of GPs on acetaminophen dosing amount and interval for fever in children and were formatted as multiple choice answers. The questionnaire were face and content validated and checked for reliability before the study (Croanbach's alpha = 0.75) in two separate sample sets of the same population.

RESULTS

51.5% of questionnaires were returned and analyzed. 41.9% of the physicians gave doses different from the recommended dose (10-15 mg/kg every 4 hours). Only 23.8% of the physicians suggested true maximal daily dose of acetaminophen. 65.7% of the responders usually or always gave prescriptions for antipyretics and 8.7% did not routinely give parents instructions on the dosing of antipyretics.

CONCLUSIONS

We found that some GPs do not strictly adhere to the dosing guidelines of acetaminophen, so intense clinical courses of pharmacology and rational usage of drugs and other relevant educational programs for medical students and practitioners seems to be necessary for the sake of safety of pediatric patients in Iran.